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Officials: We would welcome relocating business

By Katina Caraganis, kcaraganis@sentinelandenterprise.com

Updated:
12/26/2012 10:56:15 AM EST

SENTINEL & ENTERPRISE/ JOHN LOVE
The J.C. Madigan Building in Ashby, the site that owners of Fitchburg s Performance Transportation hoped to relocate to before learning that hours-of-operation restrictions would be imposed upon them.

ASHBY -- When selectmen recently attempted to restrict the operating hours of a company looking to relocate in town, they gave up an opportunity to bring in much-needed excise- and property-tax revenue.

Other community leaders say they probably would not have imposed such restrictions.

The owners of Performance Transportation Inc., a company located on Lunenburg Street in Fitchburg, were hoping to purchase 101 acres on Ashby State Road currently owned by JC Madigan.

Performance Transportation, which has been operating for more than 20 years, primarily transports gasoline to customers throughout New England.

Its owners want to house 10,000 gallons of gasoline in an above-ground tank on the site to gas up its own fleet, which would then pick up fuel elsewhere and transport it to customers.

The business is allowed under Ashby's zoning bylaws, but because flammable or combustible liquids would be stored on the property, a license from the Board of Selectmen is required.

A list of conditions was compiled by Selectman Mike McCallum, which included a proposed hours-of-operation clause to protect the integrity of the neighborhood.

As a result, the owners of the company, Julie and Zach Taylor, withdrew their application for a license because they said forcing them to close down their business for any amount of time overnight would be detrimental.

The Taylors said drivers leave at various times of the day for locations across New England and would be returning at all hours of the night.

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They said not allowing them to do that would hurt their business.

Selectman Dan Meunier said he was surprised the Taylors did not make a counter offer to the hours-of-operation stipulation before withdrawing the application.

"I was actually hoping they would come back with some type of proposal, maybe something like from 11 p.m. to 5 a.m., they would only have six trucks there or something like that," he said. "Unfortunately, that's how his business operates. Having that many trucks in and out of there at all hours is not ideal in a residential area."

The only reason the license application went before the board, Meunier said, was because fuel would be stored on the site. Otherwise, he said, the application would have gone to the Planning Board, which likely would have placed some restrictions on its approval.

"I feel bad we couldn't help him move his business to the town. I feel bad we couldn't work with him. I feel bad Madigan couldn't sell the property," Meunier said. "Everybody would have won in that situation, but there needs to be some type of restriction to protect the integrity of the neighborhood."

Neighbors expressed concern not only about the type of business and the potential for an oil spill -- which happened in 1984 at one of the gas stations in town -- but also the amount of noise the trucks would create. Because of the old spill, many wells in town are still monitored to this day.

"They said there was no way they could agree to any type of hour restrictions. I was really hoping they would come back with something," Meunier said. "He knows the nature of his business. He knows what he needs to operate. Unfortunately, the nature of his business calls for this. It had nothing to do with him, the property, or (Tim) Madigan. It didn't work out for the neighborhood."

Lunenburg Town Manager Kerry Speidel said the Board of Selectmen is the licensing authority in town and generally has not imposed any regulations on licenses like the one in Ashby.

"There are hours of operation stated on most licenses that are issued. However, the hours have always been provided by the applicant, at least to the best of my recollection I can't remember a time when the selectmen voted anything different than what was requested," she said.

Lunenburg selectmen Chairman Dave Matthews said while he doesn't want to second-guess the decision made by Ashby selectmen, he said it's always a good thing to try to promote new businesses coming to town.

"No situation comes to mind where we've had to restrict hours for anyone. With liquor licenses, most places here generally fall in line with what the state mandates in terms of hours," Matthews said. "If it's in a business area of town, we probably wouldn't impose any regulations but if it was in a residential area, maybe we would consider it. Lunenburg would be happy to work with this company."

Townsend Town Administrator Andy Sheehan said the selectmen, the licensing authority in the town, encourage new business, although they haven't recently seen any licenses for new businesses.

"There's nothing I can think of that would trigger them to go in that direction. Generally speaking, they're pro-business. It's hard to envision a business where they would go in that direction," Sheehan said. "We like to be cooperative with our businesses. We think it's good for the community, good for the residents, good for businesses to operate in a competitive marketplace."

Sheehan said a Mr. Mike's convenience store is open 24 hours a day in Townsend, and believes Sterilite operates three separate shifts and there have been no complaints about the hours of operation for those businesses.

"I couldn't say it wouldn't come up, but I couldn't anticipate a scenario where it would come up. I have seen it in other communities with 24-hour businesses involving too much traffic, but not here at all," Sheehan said.

Leominster Mayor Dean Mazzarella said the city always tries to promote new businesses and growth and has a proven track record of trying to work with developers to find the best spot in the city for their project.

"We dealt with a company not long ago. They didn't want any chance of having problems with neighbors. They couldn't take a risk. They wanted to be located in an area where nobody could have any problems with them," Mazzarella said.

That couldn't be guaranteed, Mazzarella said, and they weren't able to find a place to suit their needs while protecting the integrity of the neighborhood.

"The thing is, what I think has happened is things built years ago have been grandfathered. We used to have areas designated for industrial," said Mazzarella. "We've allowed other things to come up other than that specific use. It's more today by agreement, making sure that everyone knows what the expectations are."

He said when Wal-Mart was built in Leominster, there were lawsuits in court over the hours of operation, and Wal-Mart ultimately agreed not to open certain hours of the night.

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